


A Love Song

by ffantastic



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Drummer Keith (Voltron), M/M, Singer Lance (Voltron), and lance might just be more of a misfit than he seems, but appearances are deceiving, keith writes the lyrics for his underground band, lance is their new singer but doesn't seem very underground at all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:55:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27087451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ffantastic/pseuds/ffantastic
Summary: Keith's band is for the misfits and the outcasts. Someone like Lance doesn't fit there. Someone like Lance shouldn't get to sing the lyrics Keith wrote, when he doesn't even have the capacity to understand them.But Lance has talent, and they don't have a singer anymore.
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 141





	A Love Song

**Author's Note:**

> written for the coloratura zine, which was an amazing experience with so many talented creators!  
> hope you enjoy :)

Even from behind the stage, the murmur of the crowd buzzed in Keith's ears. His hands hadn't trembled before a concert in years, almost a decade, and his heart had never beat so fast. It was a different crowd tonight, half their original fans, half loyal fans of their new singer, a different location, but Keith didn't care about that. He was only jittery because of Lance. The single unknown, untested constant, both the reason they were here tonight at all, and the reason it could become the worst night of their lives. 

Keith hadn't liked Lance from the moment they met. He didn't need to open his mouth, didn't need to turn around from where he was already making jokes with the rest of the band. It was in his easy stance and the light-wash jeans and the way his flannel was rolled up to his forearms, this boyish charm that might have fooled everyone else and won them over. But not Keith. He had agreed to let Lance be their new singer - but only because every other applicant couldn't sing at all. He hadn't agreed to make it easy on him. 

When Keith stepped next to Lance, in the dingy place the band usually met at, he greeted him with a nod and didn't return his smile. Keith watched as their guitarist took a swig of her beer and didn't look at Lance when he dug his elbow into Keith's side. 

His voice turned sour. 

"What crawled up your ass and died, mullet?" 

Keith threw an equally acid glance back. 

"Watch it. You might be with us for now, but you know it's only until we find someone better." 

Keith didn't care to decipher the look in Lance's eyes, wide under the yellow bar lights, and ignored his slack jaw. He barely brushed past him when he made his way outside again. No wannabe popstar would get to sing _his_ lyrics with nothing but a blinding fake smile in return. 

When they started the band, Keith hadn't wanted to just be their drummer who sometimes wrote a few lyrics. He dreamed of singing the songs he wrote himself, screaming his feelings out to a crowd of people who felt the exact same way, no matter how many. But while Keith was an exceptional drummer and a decent songwriter, he wasn't good enough behind the mic to go on stage. So, they found someone else, and Keith locked the dream up somewhere deep inside. And it had been him and his three friends, Zethrid on guitar, Ezor on bass, and Acxa behind the mic, and they all shared the same vision, the same contempt for the world. 

Keith couldn't sing his words himself, but Acxa at least understood them, nodded when he read a bunch of new lyrics and ranted until late in the night with him about injustice, and what music really meant in the end. They were outsiders, they were always a little angry, and that's what made their brand. They were the Blade of Marmora. They found a small group of fans, and at least a few places they could play sometimes, and people could come watch them, and Keith could lose himself in the rhythm, pounding out his heavy heart onto the drums. 

But Acxa had to leave, for a job offer an ocean away, and Lance joined them instead. 

Lance was a talented singer, but in a regular, mainstream sort of way, talented enough to have thousands of subscribers, not talented enough for another band. The songs he covered in his videos had been top ten not too long ago. Things just went right for people like him, and even if they didn't, he'd be optimistic and laugh about it. In his voice and with his aura, their lyrics were nothing but a parody. _Keith's_ lyrics. 

Their first session together, Keith had arrived with a heavy knot in his stomach and jittery limbs. He hadn't felt this way since he first sat behind a drum set at seven years old. Maybe it wasn't just that Lance would butcher the lyrics. Maybe he was also embarrassed that Lance would read what he wrote, and then _sing_ it. To the others, Keith had never had to explain what he meant by anything, why he felt a certain way. But Lance wouldn't get it, and it was Keith's job to coach him on the lyrics, to explain and correct them. Lance did not take kindly to being corrected. 

"What are you trying to do here? I don't think you're qualified to teach me how to use my own voice." 

Coming up with the explanation had taken Keith a long time. He had to grudgingly admit Lance wasn't as bad with his songs as he had feared, but he still wasn't singing them completely right, changing the intonation of a few lines to sound softer, sad instead of accusatory. 

"Look, this is just very important to me." 

"What? And you think it doesn't mean anything to me? You think it's just a joke to me? You know what, you're a real douchebag. And no skill or talent will ever make up for that." 

"And your voice will never cover up your lack of personality, you vapid piece of shit!" 

In response, Lance flipped him off and walked away. Keith was still boiling inside, but he didn't bother following him. 

The feeling that Lance didn't get it never faded, even when the arguments lessened with every session. It morphed a little, until Keith thought that maybe _he_ was the one who wasn't getting it. There was something about Lance, something hidden, something Keith couldn't figure out. 

Where Keith once thought Lance sang like everyone else, like the stars on huge stages and with millions of followers, now he couldn't place him. Lance made the angry songs sad and the sad songs hopeful, and Keith hadn't listened to them attentively enough before. Now, he spent his nights scrolling through Lance's channel until all his videos had a red bar at the bottom, and the lilt in his voice carried Keith to sleep. No one really sang quite like Lance. 

Somewhere, hazy between sleep and the blinking red script of his alarm clock, Keith thought of love songs, the staple of pop music, and how Lance never sang them, and Keith had never written one. Between one dream and the next, the connection made sense. 

There had been one song Keith had been hesitant to let Lance sing because it was so personal to him: the song he listened to by himself the most, when emotions welled up and he felt like his teenage self again, alone and directionless. He couldn't imagine the lyrics any other way. And he also couldn't imagine Lance ever being alone or directionless. He was always surrounded by people, always going somewhere. 

Keith had watched from behind the drum set, with trepidation, playing with the foot machine and letting his sticks bounce off the cymbals, as Lance leafed through the printed lyrics. If he couldn't get this one right, they would have to change everything about who they were as a band. If he did get it right, Keith would have to change his perception of Lance. 

"Who wrote this?" 

Lance had looked up from the sheets and found Keith's eyes. 

"Ah," he'd said, "figures." 

Keith glared but said nothing. No use starting a fight when he didn't know the outcome yet. 

They played the song. And it was different - but not _bad_. It had been a large, angsty song, full of emotions only a heartbroken sixteen-year-old could feel. But Lance sang it like he was eighteen, just out of school, still a little sad, maybe still angry at the world, but hopeful. He sang it like he wanted everyone who listened to know that there was a way up even at rock bottom. 

It wasn't the original concept of the song at all, but as the last note reverberated and Keith stared at the strong lines of Lance's back, he thought that maybe it was better. 

Keith wandered backstage, to the ratty couch in a moldy room. He sank down, a sigh lodged deep in his throat. Lance had turned out to be different than he had expected, but he was still on the fence about him. He still didn't make complete sense, but maybe the last piece to complete the puzzle would be this concert. 

Keith's eyes snapped open as the couch dropped with the weight of another person. Lance wasn't looking at him, his long legs stretched out in front of him, arms crossed behind his head. He was in his outfit for the show, light blue jeans ripped at the knee, and the darkest flannel of his wardrobe in shades of grey and black. He looked as if he was about to spout off how great the concert was going to be, how amazing _he_ would be. But when he turned his gaze to Lance's face, he found his eyebrows cinched and his lips tight. 

"What's wrong?" 

He had never spoken to Lance without being prompted, without a real reason. Definitely never just because he was sitting there, looking a little lost. Keith crossed his arms across his chest and sat a bit straighter as Lance turned his eyes to him. Maybe that would keep his suddenly racing heart under control. 

Lance smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. He let himself sink in a little further into the couch. 

"You know, we're pretty similar." 

Keith furrowed his brow, looking back and forth between Lance's squeaky clean, new colorful vans and his own dirty old Doc Martens. Visually, they could almost not have been more different. 

"I don't mean that in an obvious way, like, of course we're not the same. I just meant-"

Lance sat up with vigor and scooted forward until he could grab one of Keith's hands from under his armpits and pull it free. He held on, staring straight at Keith. Their knees were touching. Lance's eyelashes were long, and there was a constellation of freckles across his nose. Keith's pulse was a wild, flighty thing underneath Lance's fingertips on his wrist. 

"You never felt like you fit in anywhere, right? You never felt like anywhere was really your place, except for music. Except for this music." 

Lance's voice had become quiet, and his thumb moved back and forth on Keith's skin. He wanted to deny it. He wanted to agree. He wanted to say something, but he just stared at Lance's fingertips tracing his veins. 

"And… I do fit in, I guess. Except for where I really want to. I'm too weird for the mainstream bands. I'm too normal for the underground bands. I'm too _me_ for any kind of music." 

Lance sighed, breaking eye contact, and let go of Keith's hand, but Keith grabbed his sleeve. There was still a thundering in Keith's ears over which he could barely make out his own thoughts, his heart twice too big for his chest, hurting for two. 

"You don't have to fit in, you know. That’s how we are. All of us don't fit. But together, we become something else." 

Lance blinked at him, eyes wide and jaw slack. Keith had to avert his eyes. He let go of Lance's sleeve, clenched and un-clenched his fingers. Something was turning in his stomach. Maybe he was going to be sick. 

"So, yeah. I think you're just right for us." 

And in saying it, he knew it was what he had been thinking all along. 

Keith barely had time to register Lance's smile before he engulfed him in a hug, scooted forward and squeezed Keith until his breath was stuck somewhere in his chest and his thoughts were a jumbled mess. But Lance was warm, and stronger than he looked, and his shampoo was a fresh smell that stuck with Keith for longer than the hug. 

When they went out onto the stage, the glorious, blinding smile Lance had worn when they'd parted still lingered. The others arrived soon after their hug, and with the air cleared between Keith and Lance, there was no barrier between any of them anymore. They were greeted by a cheer louder than Keith would've thought the small crowd of people could produce, and he felt it thrumming in his veins: No mistakes tonight. 

For the last song of the night, they played an old one their fans had loved for too many years. Through all the rehearsals, Keith had thought maybe it was a bit too much for Lance. His voice shouldn't have fit the angry, challenging lyrics at all. But tonight, it was like he was tearing apart his ribcage with every syllable. 

Keith's blood, his very essence down to the mark in his bones, vibrated with Lance's voice, with the hand clenched at Lance's chest as if he was holding his own heart. He let his hands fly, the rhythm taking its own course, and his thoughts took flight, too. His heart was a wild thing, and his lyrics, too, but maybe he would manage to write a love song one of these days. 

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos are always appreciated! let me know what you thought :)
> 
> follow me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/cheeseroyalty) for more updates


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